


space cadet

by ggemini



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: M/M, Space AU, Warnings in A/N
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-06
Updated: 2019-05-06
Packaged: 2020-02-27 09:58:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18736756
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ggemini/pseuds/ggemini
Summary: mark lee, lee jeno and lee donghyuck squint and grapple for each other through their vertigo. the galaxy nauseates itself, spin baby. fucking spin.





	space cadet

**Author's Note:**

> warnings: mention of blood, (violent) death, drug use, sexual thoughts/pornography, trauma, cursing
> 
> more warnings avec future parts, enjoy :D  
> this fic is my baby treat her with care thx

on earth a boy like mark lee, slight and scatterbrained, is worth one bonsai tree, one peace lily, four different cacti, one weeping fig, two pots of daffodils and one pot of african violets. at ten years old he learns failing to keep a plant alive leads to police at the door and heavy charges - they spent two weeks eating nothing but porridge after he stumbled onto the bluebells in the living room.

 

the machinery of faith spits him out into a family comprising of two moms and mama’s dad. that counts sixty plants (twenty per adult, ten per child and elderly) in a tiny twentieth-floor flat. there are pots on the windowsills, the floor, bedside tables, kitchen counters. his grandpa tells him once that there’s treasure to be found in a black bed of soil, but he never dares look for it. he really hates porridge.

 

there’s not a single day between the first day of elementary school, when some bigger kid knocks him over, and the day of his high school graduation, when he trips trying to put his suit on, that mark’s knees and elbows aren’t blue and yellow with bruises. it’s gravity, one of the fifty other kids living in the building says on the playground swing. doesn’t like you.

 

at some point he starts thinking of gravity as two humongous hands dragging him down by the ears and the hem of his shirt. they resemble mom’s hands a bit, ring fingers a tiny bit crooked. he figures, if he’s high enough they won’t be able to reach him.

 

first, he tries it out figuratively. his friend renjun grows up into a dealer’s ragged sneakers. every holiday he brings back martian  _ stuff _ and rolls it into these beautiful, slender spliffs. according to the law smoking anything at all would increase your plant quota by twenty, with stuff like this, makes your lungs like a galaxy, probably by a hundred. mark keeps dreaming of porridge. renjun jokes it makes you feel like you’re really worth something. in reality, it’s like anything but.

 

then it happens. mark finally feels the hands again. they pinch his arms, wake up. so the day he was supposed to go buy ten new plants with mama for his eighteenth birthday, he packs his bag and leaves.

 

he signs up to work in lee taeyong’s crew. taeyong’s ship is small but sleek, inherited from his childless aunt. “we get people from point a to point b but there’s also booze. like an interstellar party bus,” taeyong explains. “we needed someone to work the karaoke room anyway.”

 

mark signs the work contract, barely even realising what kind of lucky mess he’s getting himself into. there’s jaehyun, there’s yuta, there’s taeil. they come hang out in the dark karaoke room when the customers have passed out or any other chance they get. the disco ball spits little spots of light all over the room, the squeaky leather couch, and mark’s feet forget what firm ground feels like.

 

/

 

“who the fuck got a virus into the main system?” taeyong bristles. the crew’s sat in a circle in the kitchen, denied food and bathroom until the culprit announces himself. “you buffoons are lucky we don’t have any customers on board right now!”

 

jaehyun snorts, leans closer to mark and whispers, ”technically not, they could act as murder witnesses.”

 

taeyong throws them a nasty look. mark swallows his giggles. the fridge starts moaning and whispering obscenities in south-mercurian. 

 

yuta finally cracks, throwing his hands up in the air. ”okay, okay, i confess! i was bored so i tried downloading some porn. and i mean, with the screens you’ve got in the cockpit? phew.”

 

taeyong seethes, then eats a slice of the cheesecake the previous customers left behind and calms down. he states, ”well, i’m taking the repair fee out of your salary.”

 

yuta clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth like he wouldn’t have been kicked off any other ship by now. taeyong has a borderline disturbing need to collect charity cases. yuta’s the most eccentric of them all, jaehyun says that’s probably why taeyong likes him so much.

 

mark laughs so much he almost faints. the ceiling lights start flickering, the fridge starts reciting an age-old earther book. laughter starts to lapse into panic. into sobs. renjun’s eyes, hands. the glowing tip of a joint. the eye of the devil only earthers have ever believed in. fuck, oh fuck.  _ this ecstatic human being has a first inkling that the soul is made of stuff so mysteriously elastic that a single event can make it big enough to contain the infinite. _

 

mark lies on the ground on his stomach. taeil crosses his legs and pets the back of mark’s head. he starts talking about his home moon, the long-necked animals that were brought to the royal zoo from earth but only lasted a few weeks. the other three watch, unsure what to do. mark’s never been like this before.

 

by the time mark’s breathing smooths out yuta’s hands are over the speakers on the fridge and taeyong’s gone to the cockpit to set the course to the nearest repair station. taeil continues, ”have you ever been to stockholm? i felt like my rib cage had been cracked open and emptied out. i can barely even step foot in motels anymore.”

 

mark laughs a bit. ”the hell is he talking about?”

 

”no idea,” jaehyun admits.

 

/

 

mark’s groggy from the two and a half hours of sleep he got on the way to the station but there’s a boy with grease-stained overalls and bulky boots and a nose so straight it’s like a ruler was taped to it when he was a baby. he sets his toolbox down by the entrance ramp, so gentle not a single nail clinks, and starts walking around and under the ship. he scratches at the paint where it’s chipped with the nail of his thumb, runs his hand along the underside of the wings.

 

“beautiful ship,” he reports to the guy who’s discussing prices with taeyong. taeyong squirms a bit, flattered.

 

the head mechanic, kim doyoung according to his nametag, casts a bland look over the ship. “yeah. there’s some kind of virus in the central system, go check it out.”

 

the boy picks up his toolbox and jogs up the ramp. doyoung resumes his sales pitch: new paint coat and oiling. discount price, you won’t get this few zeroes anywhere else in the system. taeyong rolls his head from left to right, meaning he’s about to give in.

 

”i forgot something in the dorm,” mark blurts. yuta gives him an absent minded nod.

 

mark treks up the ramp. the boy’s in the cockpit and yuta was right, phew. but mark steels himself. he clears his throat, says, ”hey.”

 

the boy turns, surprised. his cheeks are red. ”hi?”

 

it occurs to mark that this is a suicide mission. ”i’m mark,” he bumbles on, ”from the crew.”

 

it’s horrible, pretending the background noise isn’t as obscene as it is. the guy replies, ”jeno. mechanic.” 

 

”i just came to get something from the,” mark trails off, gesturing towards the dorm.

 

jeno nods. his hair curls over his temple. ”right, yeah.”

 

mark returns to the rest of the crew with his loot (a name and a barely suppressed hard-on). openly staring at his crotch, jaehyun slaps him between the shoulderblades and says, ”good thing you’re feeling better.”

 

/

 

the hotel rooms are small and worn but clean enough. the bed is narrow. there’s a framed picture of some cassiopeian penguin-like animal, long extinct, on the wall.

 

mark unpacks his bag, repacks it and unpacks it again to keep himself from thinking. that done, he flips through television channels, waiting for jaehyun’s knock on the door. his head is a frothing cauldron. there’s renjun, there’s the virus, there’s jeno and his silent toolbox.

 

mark was doing so well, what went wrong? high school’s repeating himself, he thought the hands were far behind when really he’d just numbed himself. he kicks his trousers off and stands in front of the mirror. no bruises on his shins or knees or thighs. the carpet’s soft under his bare feet.

 

jaehyun’s knock, three times in rapid succession, comes like a salvage. mark opens and jaehyun, rolled towel under his arm and flip flops dangling from his hand, glances at his boxers. ”am i interrupting something?”

 

a terrifying mix of trauma and wet dream, actually. but mark only laughs and says, ”nah. wait a sec.” he picks his trousers up off the floor, puts them on and grabs his own bath things.

 

the station’s a maze of bigger and smaller halls connected to each other by echoey tunnels. in one of the tunnels, they check no one else’s around and scream out stupidities. mark goes, ”giraffes!” and the walls answer giraffes, giraffes, giraffes. jaehyun’s dimples are as deep as his laugh.

 

the bathhouse’s in one of the smaller halls, downstairs from a cheap eatery. the bell above the door chimes and the keys in the wooden rack on the wall jingle. the receptionist looks up. mark has to take a deep breath.

 

”two bathers, please,” jaehyun says, leaning on the counter as the receptionist turns around to pick keys off the rack like plums from a tree.

 

mark asks, ”we’re not going to wait for the others?”

 

”no, taeyong’s sleeping his headache off. yuta and taeil are already inside,” jaehyun replies through a yawn.

 

the receptionist takes the money jaehyun’s set down and slides two keys over the counter. ”excuse me for asking,” he begins. his accent’s strange and somnolent, ”but where are you from?” he props his elbows on the counter, leans forward.

 

jaehyun smiles easily. ”saturn,” he says, pointing at himself, then pointing at mark, ”and earth.”

 

the receptionist smiles. his tongue peeks out between his teeth. ”oh. there’s shampoo and bodywash by the showers.”

 

a gentle blue mountain range circles around the room. when mark and jaehyun walk in, yuta and taeil are already one foot in an argument about whether it’s a rendition of the famous chain of mountains owned by pluto’s monarch or a little ridge near yuta’s hometown not even taeil’s heard of.

 

mark’s feet prickle when he first steps into the bath. he slides down until the only parts of his body above the surface are his face and his knees. there’s the hum of water. the others’ bickering filters through.

 

mark realises he could’ve asked the receptionist where he was from. or why he asked about their origins. or his name.

 

martian doesn’t seem too far fetched. he had stiff black hair and a scar above his eye like the ones so many martians consider their most prized possessions. thin frame, long limbs, average height.

 

renjun’s mom was from mars. she had rough knuckles and dark eyes and nothing much to say. she was always sitting in the living room whenever mark came over, sighing into her palms. but once, mark and renjun were eight and seven years old, she put them to bed.

 

the solar system renjun’s dad had made out of papier-mâché made a lazy circle above their heads. they had their duvets pulled up to their chins. renjun’s mom dug a balloon out of the bedside table’s drawer, blew it full of air and asked, ”who wants a dream?”

 

renjun did but mark got to go first because he was the guest. renjun’s mom pressed the mouth of the balloon against his forehead. she smiled, creases around the corners of her mouth. ”ready? what would you like to dream about?”

 

”space,” mark said, for a lack of any other ideas.

 

renjun’s mom hummed. she loosened her hold around the mouth of the balloon. air started to squeak through. ”close your eyes. good - well, there’s wind so loud you think your ears are going to burst. stars everywhere like a sieve, you know, like the things you use to drain pasta. there are planets, blue, purple, brown, red, yellow, white. there are space ships, you like those, right? they zoom past so fast you almost fall over.” 

 

mark can almost feel the purple dust of nebulas on his cheeks. the waves of a supernova in his bones. renjun’s giggles bleed through and mingle with his mother’s voice modest like a square of cotton. the balloon empties out, hissing and pulling. there’s a cross drawn on papier-mâché mars’ flank.

 

mark gasps and opens his eyes. maybe not?

 

taeil’s rubbing shampoo into his hair, sat on a plastic stool. ”lost yourself again?” he asks.

 

mark floats in the water for a bit longer. yuta and jaehyun have already gone to the changing room. taeil hums a tune. mark gets up.

 

/

 

after an average breakfast in the hotel’s restaurant, the whole crew converges in taeyong’s room to watch soap operas. this particular one has a girl whose lover might be her brother. the doubt is denied by her father who rises from his grave as a cyborg. taeyong gasps at every single cheap plot twist.

 

”how long are we going to stay here?” jaehyun asks, rummaging through the minibar.

 

”dunno,” taeyong answers from behind yuta’s back, where he’s hiding from the suspense. ”mark, go ask doyoung.”

 

mark has half the mind to whine. in the end, he doesn’t have the energy, so he gets up to put on his shoes. he yanks the velcros tight and sets off. the carpet in the hotel’s hallways swallows the sound of his footsteps, like he’s not really there.

 

he doesn’t find doyoung but he finds jeno, legs sticking out from under a squat ship. ”donghyuck?” jeno calls, drumming his heels against the ground in irritation, ”where the hell did you go? you were supposed to help me with the tools.”

 

mark looks around the hangar. ”uh,” he clears his throat, ”no donghyuck here, i think.”

 

jeno rolls out and sits up. ”oh, mark. hey.” he must wondering why all their meetings are stupid like this, too. ”what’s up?”

 

mark doesn’t know what to do with his hands so he stuffs them in his pockets. ”the captain sent me to ask how soon we’re going to be able to continue on our way.”

 

jeno counts in his head for a second, then comes out with, ”everything should be done by the day after tomorrow. i just have to paint the window frames and put up a couple more safety measures so there won’t be any more viruses like -  _ that _ , in the future.”

 

”oh, okay. thanks.” mark nods. he turns to leave.

 

”mark, wait,” jeno blurts out. ”would you mind handing me tools? my friend was supposed to do it but he seems to have bailed.” he raps his knuckles against the side of his toolbox.

 

mark agrees easily. he sits down and waits. when jeno says spanner, he hands over a spanner. when jeno says screwdriver, he hands over a screwdriver. during the pockets of time in-between he thinks about the butterscotch yellow wall behind the bathhouse receptionist and taeil’s vertebrae as he slouched on the stool. jeno’s breaths go deep and slow every time he comes across a tight bolt.

 

jeno’s friend comes back. mark turns to look and finds the bathhouse receptionist, who says, ”hey, it’s earth boy.”

 

”mark,” mark corrects.

 

the receptionist’s smile is vaguely heart-shaped. ”right, mark,” he chuckles. ”i’m donghyuck.”

 

jeno’s rolled out again. leaning against the ship’s side, he deadpans, ”where were you?”

 

donghyuck holds up a bag. “i got us lunch,” he announces proudly. he shifts his gaze to mark. “i didn’t know we were going to be three, though, i’m sorry.”

 

mark shakes his head, no worries. donghyuck sits down on the glossy ground. jeno wipes his hands with a rag finger by finger, thumb index middle.

 

jeno and donghyuck don’t talk much as they munch on their triangle sandwiches. jeno eats the crust first, then makes a spiral to the centre. donghyuck just bites in until the corners of his mouth. mark’s a strange organ transplanted into a body too beautiful for it, he realises that. and the chirurgian did a terrible job, none of their meetings have been anything but embarrassing.

 

“you want some?” donghyuck asks mark, holding out his second sandwich.

 

“no thank you. i ate breakfast late,” mark declines. “but excuse me for asking-” donghyuck looks at him with a twinkle in his eye. he remembers, “-where are  _ you _ from?”

 

jeno pauses and glances at donghyuck. he’s obviously waiting for a bad reaction. but donghyuck smiles, tilts his head a bit. “hmm. from a little moon somewhere, i guess.” he rubs at the scar above his eye.

 

“you guess?” mark repeats. taeil’s also from an unspecified little moon. maybe it’s a thing.

 

donghyuck looks away. he laughs, “yeah.”

 

from the way jeno’s rearranging his tools by size mark knows not to prod any further, so instead he goes, “and you, jeno?”

 

“this station. born and raised,” jeno says. he sets his hammer down carefully, lies down on the little trolley again and rolls under the ship. “you’re always on the move, right? on the ship. i can’t imagine what it’s like.”

 

“oh, yeah, i am.” being away from home is bliss, it’s airing the stench of vomit out of the karaoke room and moving so fast you can’t even make out the pictures in your own mind. mark can’t imagine what it’d be like to be from a small, far-away station and stay put with his thoughts, to repair ships with smudges of oil on his cheeks. “it’s nice.”

 

jeno wiggles his feet, he’s probably chuckling. it was a bland answer. donghyuck seems to make up his mind on something and says, “you coming to the bathhouse tonight?”

 

“don’t know, depends on how the other feel,” mark says. he waits for a bit, then when donghyuck only hums, gets up to go. “the captain’s probably wondering what’s taking me so long. maybe i should,” he jerks a thumb over his shoulder.

 

jeno pushes himself out from under the ship enough to give mark a surprised look and says, “oh, okay then. see you.”

 

donghyuck raises his hand in a shy little wave. mark turns around and goes, even if the soap opera most likely already ended ages ago.

 

/

 

“but we already went yesterday,” jaehyun protests when mark asks if they can go to the bathhouse. yes, but donghyuck’s there with whatever he thought of saying but didn’t. mark doesn’t open his mouth though. he lets jaehyun go on, “have you been rolling around in dirt or something?”

 

only on the hotel room’s floor. he fell off the narrow bed, dragged by the ankle by a cold, clammy nightmare. starlight trickled in quietly through the blinds. it’s like the virus’s snuck into his system. maybe he should ask jeno to take a look.

 

“i haven’t gone yet,” taeyong cuts in. “i’ll join you.”

 

so while taeyong finishes up work stuff and the others go roam the station for something to do, mark lies on the bed, feet dangling over the edge. the frame on this room’s wall has a copy of a movie poster. 

 

mark wonders if taeyong saw him that first day at the docks and thought ah, there’s one that needs saving. arguably no one from the crew looks particularly haunted even when they are. mark imagines a third eye on taeyong’s forehead, long-lashed, seeing through all of their skulls.

 

“okay,” taeyong sighs. he’s finally done calling past customers about repair fees and filling the ship’s calendar with stag nights. “let’s go.”

 

donghyuck hands them the keys. mark turns the seal keyring in his hand. it’s locker number six again, the corner of donghyuck’s eye glints. 

 

taeyong sits on the changing room bench. “i swear i’m getting rashes from all this sitting around, thinking about all the jobs we’re missing,” taeyong says. he takes his shirt off and shows mark the patch of pink over his ribs. “all the drunkards waiting to be lugged to venus’ golden coasts! we’re failing the universe, mark.”

 

mark laughs. later on in the bath, he remembers the joke taeyong probably didn’t really intend to be that funny and starts giggling again. taeyong continues slathering himself with body wash, shaking with suppressed laughter. the cogwheels of the universe.

 

when mark reappears at the reception, a single lick of hair sticking up, donghyuck furrows his eyebrows in puzzled amusement. the only hair dryer fixed to the wall next to the changing room mirrors only spat out tepid air with dizzying force. “are you doing anything right now?”

 

taeyong peers over mark’s shoulder. mark feels the soft gust of his chuckle on his shoulder. “no, he’s not. see you.” 

 

the bell over the door jingles and taeyong’s gone. donghyuck watches him go. he turns back to mark and says, “your captain?” he runs his fingers over the rows of notches gnawed into the counter with the keys.

 

“yup. the man himself,” mark answers.

 

donghyuck chuckles. turning around to put the keys back, he says, “jeno should be here in a sec.”

 

/

 

they sit in the furthest corner of a little restaurant. it’s fifteen minutes until closing time but jeno and donghyuck tell mark it’s fine, the owner’s doyoung’s cousin.

 

mark finds himself in the middle of a relationship that seems like a bit of an accident. jeno and donghyuck, he finds out as the conversation progresses and becomes fragmented and jumps from one topic to another, don’t know all that much about each other either. donghyuck only arrived on the station a few months ago and jeno just somehow ended up being around.

 

why they’re telling mark, a guy even jeno’s only known for two days, all of this, isn’t fitting in his head at all. perhaps they figured he’ll leave soon anyway. no one in the whole galaxy’s going to covet this information. no one’s going to track mark down and disguise themselves into a client to get close to him and torture him in the karaoke room to extract a testimony out of him on why jeno and donghyuck share lunch every day when they don’t even know each other’s birthdays.

 

mark takes a deep breath and slows his imagination down a bit.

 

mark leans his whole weight on the exact same reasoning when jeno finally asks him why he left earth in the first place. he can’t reveal everything straight away because the hinges of his safe are rusty but he does say this: “my friend died and i just couldn’t stay.”

 

donghyuck’s spoon pauses a few centimetres from his mouth. “oh. a violent death?” jeno throws him a warning look.

 

mark swallows. he looks at jeno’s left ear to keep the limbs and the blood and the concrete out of his eyes. “you could say that.”

 

“i’m sorry,” jeno half-whispers. his eyelashes cast long shadows over his cheeks under the booth’s lamp’s glaring light.

 

mark hasn’t told the crew. in fact, he’s never opened his mouth to tell anyone a single thing about renjun. back home everyone knew without a word from him, everyone knew to say oh no and my condolences and keep strong. that’s the reason, he guesses, why he left.

 

a relief is not what it is, to finally say it out loud. it doesn’t feel like anything, just the press of his tongue against his palate. jeno looks at him like he’s hurting. donghyuck, like he’s numb. he must hate mark. the privileged guy from the old world who’s whining about having fucked it all up by himself.

 

but donghyuck says, “you should join us for lunch tomorrow.”

 

/

 

mark does. jeno and donghyuck give him a card.  _ hope your ship breaks around here again soon from jeno and donghyuck.  _ when he opens it a rain of hologram confetti bursts out.

 

“please don’t jinx it, taeyong’s going to kill me,” mark snickers. blue, green, yellow and pink bits of paper swirl around the room. he watches a tiny recording of jeno and donghyuck dancing on top of the hologram chip below the text. over and over again.

 

mark almost regrets telling jeno and donghyuck what he did. what do they care about a kid and his friend from the other side of the system, about rolling paper and stairs and ten leftover plants. even if all he did was utter one sentence.

 

well, in a day he’s going to be on the other side of the system anyway.

 

the confetti melts into jeno’s shoulders as he gobbles up his lunch. once he’s done, he gathers his stuff. “i have to go back to work. it was nice meeting you,” he says, hovering by the door, “even if it was for such a short time.”

 

“yeah, bye,” mark answers, panicking. jeno laughs and shakes his head. then, he’s gone.

 

donghyuck leans his chin on the palm of his hand. “it’s a shame you have to go.”

 

/

 

mark wakes up on the bed this time. he stares at the time projected on the ceiling. nine, which is three hours after he was supposed to be ready to go. but donghyuck’s bottom lip looked so gentle in his dreams, renjun wasn’t around.

 

he runs down to the hangar. the ship isn’t there but doyoung is. he looks at mark, his hastily packed bag by his feet. he says, “got left behind?”

 

by the looks of it, mark did get left behind. in a contradicting and foolish hope he could stay a bit longer, he turned his alarm off, thinking someone would come wake him up. yuta’s got away with sleeping in so many times mark can’t even count anymore.

 

doyoung snorts. “aw, don’t look so sad. your captain told me to tell you about your surprise paid leave. congrats.”

 

doyoung is horrible at being reassuring, whether that was his intention or not. mark replies, “did he say why?”

 

doyoung shakes his head. “maybe try calling him.”

 

taeyong picks up on the second try. “hi mark,” he says, an apologetic look on his face.

 

mark has to swallow down a lot of emotions before he manages, “why’d you leave without me?”

 

taeyong sighs. yuta’s right ear hovers in the picture for a second. “you need to take a break. and i knew you wouldn’t agree if i just asked you.”

 

taking a break makes mark a stationary target and he doesn’t want that. is taeyong’s third eye shut, why can’t he see mark can’t stop? mark’s angry at taeyong and his saviour complex, he’s mad at the others for not putting cogs in taeyong’s wheels.

 

“i don’t know what happened in the past and it doesn’t matter now, but you need to sort it out as well as you can,” taeyong continues.

 

mark starts relaxing his muscles one by one. “where am i going to stay?” he forces out. there’s nothing he can do about it now.

 

“doyoung’s agreed to let you sleep at his place,” taeyong explains. doyoung hums. “i took care of all the basic stuff, you just need to kick back. we’ll come get you in a week or two.”

 

yuta’s hand reaches into the shot to end the call. mark stands in the middle of the airstrip like an idiot who’s missed his ride.

 

doyoung gets up from his foldable stool. he walks over and pats mark between the shoulderblades, humming, “listen, i still have some work to get done. you can wait in the staff room or wherever.”

 

the staff room door’s handle is covered in greasy fingerprints. mark sets his bag down by the imbalanced table and digs out his toothbrush. he didn’t have time to brush his teeth earlier so he hunches over the kitchen sink, elbows propped against the edges of the basin.

 

as mark spits out the white foam, jeno walks in. the heels of his boots click together when he stops at the door, surprised. “you’re still here?”

 

mark looks over his shoulder. there’s a dollop of foam on his chin. “i missed my alarm so my crew left me.”

 

jeno bursts out in laughter. he puts his toolbox on the table and pulls out a chair. “so then what? you’re just going to stay here?” he asks, still laughing.

 

“for a couple of weeks, yeah,” mark says.

 

jeno shakes his head, eyes squeezed into crescents of the moon. “to think we even got you a farewell card.”

 

/

 

doyoung shows mark how to open the door. you’ve got to pull, turn the key and push. mark follows him in, through the cramped entryway and the tiny combination of kitchen, living room and laundry room, into a cluttered side room.

 

they clear enough space between endless towers of boxes (old souvenirs from every corner of the galaxy, plates, ship parts) for a short mattress. mark puts on the bed sheets, tucking the corners under the mattress clumsily.

 

doyoung leans on the doorframe. “i suggest you try to find something to do while you’re here,” he says, watching mark sit cross-legged on the mattress. maybe he sees mark doesn’t fancy staying put with his thoughts, maybe he just doesn’t want mark in his flat all day.

 

mark blinks. “oh. like what?”

 

“don’t know,” doyoung says, shrugging, “that’s for you to decide. but i can ask around if anyone needs help.”

 

“that would be great, thanks,” mark says.

 

doyoung leaves and mark lies down. he breathes in the smell of doyoung’s detergent. the shock and betrayal have made way for a faint sense of relief. he barely knows them but jeno and donghyuck are starting to feel more and more like a firewall.

 

doyound knocks on the door. popping his head in, he says, “i have to go back to work. you can tag along if you want.”

 

/

 

the bathhouse’s reception’s empty. jeno shares a perplexed look with mark, then calls out, “donghyuck?”

 

a tap’s turned off somewhere in the back. donghyuck walks out of the changing room with a mop. the toes and heels of his socks are soaked. “sorry, sorry, i was mopping,” he says, leaving his slippers in the doorway. he looks up, sees mark, says, “huh.”

 

jeno does a little ta-dah gesture in mark’s direction. donghyuck laughs and pads behind the desk in his socks, footfall soft like bouncing stars.

 

mark explains what happened, again. donghyuck snickers, mocking, and gives him key number six. jeno, number three.

 

sneaking glances at jeno kicking off his boots and undoing his heavy belt and stepping out of his boilersuit, mark can hear the infuriating jingle the virus played every two hours in his inner ears. donghyuck’s polishing the front desk, humming low and sweet, like taeil. again, a small moon boy thing as it seems.

 

jeno looks too but mark barely catches the flutter of his eyelashes. they walk to the baths, joking around, wash themselves, and sink into the water. donghyuck sits in the doorway with his mop and half-broken slippers, knees propped against the doorframe. 

 

“do you know which mountains these are?” mark asks. the rub of skin against the tub as jeno shifts pierces his voice.

 

donghyuck takes a long hard look. “hmm,” he says, “no. who cares anyway?”

 

mark has to laugh. jeno washes himself of oil and sweat with a sigh.

 

/

 

“well,” doyoung grumbles, throwing a bag of takeout on the kitchen table and turning to get utensils from the drawer, “my cousin doesn’t need help right now and i couldn’t think of any other place that would hire you for such a short time. so why don’t you come to the repair station?”

 

mark can’t really afford to be picky. he says, “yeah, sure. but what would i do?”

 

“make coffee, probably,” doyoung delivers bluntly. his mouth cracks into a half-assed smile. “keep jeno company so he has someone else to tell about the ships he saw on catalogues. i can’t pay you an awful lot, though.”

 

“no, no. you already let me stay at yours,” mark declines, waving his hands. “and i don’t really need any money. just to get my mind off things.”

 

doyoung hums like he knows. mark’s having a hard time deciphering his real nature, whether he’s just rude or trying to cover up his generosity with asperity.

 

/

 

after a week of making not very good coffee and sitting next to jeno’s tool box, listening to him go on about a pegasus 3000 and the power of the engines, the  _ shape of the hull, mark, i couldn’t sleep for two days thinking about it _ , mark comes to the conclusion that doyoung is much nicer than he lets on.

 

staying at the station also has been quite nice, even though renjun sometimes walks through his dreams with his shoelaces open. on thursday, donghyuck punches renjun on the nose. there’s blood, thin like water all over. renjun staggers away. jeno watches it happen with docile eyes. mark wakes up.

 

on sunday renjun still hasn’t been back in mark’s dreams. mark, jeno and donghyuck sit in donghyuck’s little room upstairs from the bathhouse. the walls are pasted full of movie posters. there’s one single window near the ceiling, tiny and square.

 

“sometimes it rains crystals,” donghyuck says out of the blue, “on my moon.”

 

jeno looks up from his lap, startled, and mark’s learned to get startled with him. donghyuck doesn’t talk about his home, it’s obvious he’s followed around by a shadow. mark sometimes wonders if taeyong would’ve added him to the collection.

 

donghyuck taps on the scar above his eye. “got this as a kid in one of those rains. my brother shielded me from most of it, though.” he smiles and ducks his head like he’s a bit embarrassed.

 

mark and jeno glance at each other, unsure what to do. donghyuck’s never been like this before.

 

“do you want to talk about it?” mark asks.

 

donghyuck smiles. “maybe soon. i think.”

 

mark sets his own clock to soon, too. jeno looks lost because what are you supposed to say to something like that, mark gets it. he’s from a station with a number for a name, it never ever rains, and he’s sandwiched between two boys with each a secret of their own, like an exotic disease they’ve brought with them.

 

“anyway,” donghyuck says, “who wants to sneak into the bathhouse?”

 

so donghyuck fits the key into the lock and they tiptoe through the dark reception. jeno can’t stop giggling, donghyuck switches on the water, they leave their clothes all over the dressing room benches.

 

steam rises almost like in columns. mark sits in the hot water, wondering how he can stay in the same tub with jeno and donghyuck, knees knocking together from time to time, without losing his mind. the virus’ jingle starts playing in his head again, he’s jerked off to these two guys and it’s so dirty he has to get up.

 

mark’s already one foot out of the bath when jeno grabs his wrist, springs up and leans forward to kiss him, on the mouth and all. the inside of jeno’s mouth feels smooth and cool. his lips are soft and lazy, his fingers digging into mark’s waist. his little towel’s somewhere, who knows where.

 

it must be an awkward angle to look at them from, donghyuck bursts out into laughter. jeno abandons mark’s desperate mouth in favour of turning to donghyuck, crouching and kissing the laughter out of him.

 

mark stands over the edge of the tub. water drips somewhere, drip drip drip. right now he can barely remember renjun’s face, donghyuck opens his eyes to glance at him past jeno.


End file.
